CPLC Seminar series: 'What was the actio oneris aversi?'

Speaker: Dr Peter Candy (St Catharine’s College, Cambridge)

Abstract: D.19.2.31 contains a reply to a question of law which is attributed in Justinian’s Digest to the late-Republican jurist P. Alfenus Varus. At the beginning of the text, we are told that several people had delivered grain under contract to a certain Saufeius which was shot into a common pile in the hold of his ship; and that after Saufeius had returned grain to one of them the ship went down. The question is asked if the others can proceed against Saufeius in respect of their share of the grain by raising an action for onus aversum. In a previous article, I studied the text for its stylistic qualities, especially its chiastic structure and the inferences about authorship that could be made on that basis. In this paper I intend to investigate further the nature and content of the otherwise unattested actio oneris aversi. To do so I divide the discussion into three parts: (1) Representing the text in light of my conclusions about authorship; (2) Additional considerations about the logical and rhetorical structure of the responsum; and (3) Investigation of the nature and content of the actio oneris aversi by comparison with the commission of the English tort of conversion in so-called ‘Wheat cases’. My conclusion is that the action lay for ‘conversion’ of a cargo, possessing similar features to an action for conversion in the common law.

Open to Faculty members, visitors, invitees and LLM/MCL/PhD students only.

Sandwiches served in G11 from 12.30pm; seminar to commence in the Moot Court Room at 1–2pm.

The Cambridge Private Law Centre acknowledges with gratitude the generous financial support of Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP and of South Square.